This is a meeting where an independent facilitator brings together all the parties involved in an incident where harm has been caused and allows the participants to clearly communicate their thoughts and feelings, and decide on the way forward. RJ conferences use the principles of the 3 R’s of:

Responsibility: Participants take responsibility for their actions and the harm they have caused.

Reparation: There is repairing of the harm – whether through a physical act or an apology of some sort. This could be direct the individual or to the community.

Re-Integration: The re-integration of both the person who has caused harm or been harmed back into their own ‘community’ with the matter no longer being a barrier between them.

These principles can be used in a number of ways that fall short of the amount of preparation and organisation required for a conference. This includes mediation, letters of apology, family meetings, problems solving and even just general discussions. However none of them can match the restorative power of bringing people together who are not communicating. Conferences can have as few as two people and as many people as have been harmed. Conferences involving whole streets full of people have been run, although this is not something to be considered lightly due to the level of expertise needed to organise and run such an event. Training to facilitate a conference can be completed in a relatively short time, particularly if it is run using a ‘script’.

The scripted model of Restorative conference was developed by the Australian Police as a means of getting high levels of consistency with the minimum of experience and training provided for facilitators. This is a very successful format that can be adapted for a number of settings and still achieve excellent results and should be a priority for any church looking to re-introduce restorative practices.